SEC Classic: 1969 Tennessee vs Ole Miss

40th anniversary this weekend of one of the SEC's most famous/infamous games.

On November 15, 1969 #3 and 7-0 Tennessee faced 5-3 and unranked Ole Miss at Mississippi Memorial Stadium in Jackson,Miss.As the Rebels were want to do, they played their bigger games in Jackson in that era,and really until the late 1980's.Oddly enough, this was the first time Ole Miss played Tennessee in Jackson,having played its "home game" vs the Vols in Memphis. In fact, Tennessee had defeated Ole Miss 20-7 in 1967 in Memphis to end a 8 game losing streak to the Rebels.

The third ranked Vols were the choice of the Orange Bowl to face the Big 8 champion in the second year of the Orange Bowl's new tie-in with the Big 8. The Vols had played in the Orange following the '67 season and lost a heartbreaker to Big 8 champion Oklahoma.(Like the Sugar and the SEC,the Orange seemed to feature many Big 8 teams,but it wasn't official with the two until '68). The Vols seemed to prefer the Orange to the Sugar as the Cotton was out of the question as the Vols had played their the prior year being humiliated 36-13 by that other Orange and White UT,Texas.

Ole Miss' 5-3 record was very misleading.The Rebels were in the midst of their NCAA leading 12th consectutive bowl streak and had had high hopes for the 1969 season.Ole Miss started off the season ranked #9 and moved up to #8 after a season opening win over Memphis State.

Ole Miss' game plan the following week against a bad Kentucky team backfired.With Alabama coming up the next week,Ole Miss planned to run the ball instead of use Archie Manning's arm and his excellent receiving corp in order to not show the Tide coaching staff too much. Not a bad plan,really as Indiana had defeated the Wildcats 58-30 on the same field in Lexington a week earlier.Nonetheless,Kentucky pulled off a shocker, 10-9.

The loss the next week to Alabama, 33-32 is legendary in and of itself.But to Ole Miss' credit,they didn't throw in the towel and Johnny Vaught reminded them about "matter of fact pride". Over the next three weeks,Ole Miss ended the unbeaten streaks of two other top 10 ranked SEC teams on this same field in Jackson: following the Alabama heartbreaker, Ole Miss came from behind to defeat #6 Georgia, 25-17.#8 LSU fell three weeks later, 26-23. Independent Houston, with an amazing offense with their 'veer' who would finish the season 12th,did thump the Rebels, 25-11 in the Astrodome.

Tennessee was anywhere from a 6 to 11 pt favorite that afternoon.The Vols had really only been pushed once, that by eventual ACC champion South Carolina,who led 14-7 in the 4th before UT scored 22 to win a misleading 29-14 game.Tennessee had beaten a good Auburn team 45-19 and won decisive games on the road vs Alabama and Georgia.

But like most 'big games' this one had subplot ,which really grew over the years.The main characters were Ole Miss QB Manning and Tennessee LB Steve Kiner.

When Tennessee and Ole Miss met in Knoxville the prior year,Tennessee crushed Ole Miss 31-0 helped in part by Ole Miss' 7 interceptions,5 by Manning. That game was still fresh on Kiner's mind when the SEC "Skywriter's Tour" landed in Knoxville in August '69. (Before the current format with SEC Media Days in Birmingham,beat writers and columnists from around the South would fly togethor to each SEC school one at a time).

Kiner was asked a seemingly innocuous question with a follow-up:'who do you think is the best team in the SEC ?' Kiner responded with his own Vols,then maybe Alabama or Georgia. The follow-up was ,"What about Ole Miss ? They look like they have the horses ?"

Tampa,Florida native Kiner responded,"a lot of people go to a farm and can't tell the difference between a horse and a mule."The Vols football media folks knew Kiner had stepped in it and tried to defuse the comment,but it didn't work.

Kiner,the son of a military officer who spent time as a Japanese POW in WWII,was no stranger to controversy having been involved in many fights with teammates,usually leaving the other guy with a broken jaw or other injuries.His arrival at UT in the first place came after committing to Florida and smarting off to a prominent UF booster's daughter while Kiner was doing work for her father,which resulted in the Gators revoking his offer.

The week of the game a small aircraft dropped some leaflets over the Ole Miss practice field.The papers said things like, "Archie Who ?", "Archie Mud" and "Wreck the Mules, Vols #1". Turned out Johnny Vaught himself arranged for all of this,but he never let on as Ole Miss came down to Jackson ready to take on the Kansas City Chiefs,if not just the Vols.

Talk about "talent", Ole Miss took the field with 7 players who were first or second team All-SEC and the Vols took the field with 8.



Ole Miss took the kickoff and went 82 yards in 11 plays,mostly running to go up 7-0.Following a short UT punt,Ole Miss needed ust 38 yds to go up 14-0. Following a 49 yd punt return,Manning passed for td to go up 21-0 as the 2nd qtr started.Ole Miss could do no wrong. Before halftime ,Ole Miss kicker Cloyce Hinton who had made a school and SEC record 59 yd fg on the same field 5 weeks earlier vs Georgia,kicked a low 42 yarder that hit the crossbar and bounced over for a 24-0 lead.The Orange Bowl scouts who an hour early were ready to invite Tennessee regardless "as long as as UT doesn't lose in a rout", headed for the exits.

Ole Miss tacked on two more td's in the second half. After going up 31-0 ,Manning yelled at Kiner "how do you like those mules ?" The final was 38-0.

That fall, CBS had debuted a new show called "Hee Haw" which featured a silly looking cartoon donkey,mule,whatever in the show's opening.



The worm turned on Kiner,who after his 'mules' comment back fired was known as "Hee Haw Kiner" outside of Knoxville for a brief period. That's what the reference is about in "The Ballad of Archie Who" LINK

Tennessee did win the SEC but wound up in the Gator Bowl and lost to Florida 14-13 in Doug Dickey's last game as UT coach,who took over for his alma mater UF after Ray Graves' resignation.

Ole Miss went on to finish 8-3 after a Sugar Bowl win over Arkansas, 27-22.